Balfour Declaration

The Balfour Declaration was the name given to the United Kingdom's pledge to support the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine, contained in a 2 November 1917 letter from Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to the leading British Zionist, Walter Rothschild. The letter pledged that the Jewish state should be established without prejudice to the civil and religious rights of the non-Jews of Palestine. The declaration contradicted the British government's support for the leaders of the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire, as the leaders of the revolt were supposed to be recognized as the rulers of Palestine. The declaration was confirmed by the Triple Entente and became the basis of Mandatory Palestine, granted by the League of Nations in 1920. The failure to reconcile the declaration with pledges to the Arabs led to future problems in the region, including a 1937 revolt and a 1948 war between the Jewish state of Israel and the neighboring Arab countries.